In January 2026, the Communications Manager for the City of Trail, B.C. reached out to commission a full redesign of their annual community and visitors guide, bringing me on as Art Director for the project. With the city celebrating its 125th anniversary, the publication was being expanded into a 44 page, 8" x 10.5" commemorative edition; a fitting moment to rethink how it looked and felt from the ground up.
Before any design work began, I met with the Communications Manager and the Manager of the Trail Museum & Archives to understand their vision, reviewed past issues of the guide to identify what was and wasn't working, and familiarized myself with the existing 125th anniversary branding. The city had already established an anniversary logo and a set of illustrated banners, featuring a subtle arrow motif designed to suggest movement and momentum, that were appearing in signage around Trail. From there, as Art Director, I was given complete creative and artistic control over the redesign.
I developed a colour-coded section system to organize the directory listings and give the publication a clear visual structure, and incorporated the arrow shape from the city's anniversary banners as a recurring header element, tying the guide back to the broader 125th campaign. A custom tombstone end mark was designed to close each editorial story. For the inside front cover, at the city's request, I built a photo collage within the anniversary logo as an opening statement for the issue. All editorial content, photography, and advertising was provided by the city, with their photo library available for supporting imagery. The stories themselves covered the full character of Trail: its history, its sports legacy, and the volunteer community at the heart of the city.
All layout work was done in Adobe InDesign, with photo editing and colour correcting in Photoshop and vector graphics, including illustrations and the arrow elements, built in Illustrator.
The primary challenges were editorial rather than creative. Shifting advertisement counts and last-minute size changes required story layouts flexible enough to reflow without falling apart, and keeping directory listings intact across the publication demanded careful planning throughout.
© City of Trail
© City of Trail
© City of Trail
© City of Trail
© City of Trail
© City of Trail
© City of Trail
© City of Trail
© City of Trail